![[81DEsreadXL._SL1360_.jpg]] *Here's a [link to mine](https://www.amazon.com/American-Environmental-History-Dan-Allosso/dp/1981731733/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1R4Z15FAM1XY7&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.uzFHG7vztk6xyg3G7k6BJ6tOl81VAWlHwUa33QjXL1DcbXCvwTXPwnAWKLWUJkX6A7JhxQsJYxFuuHsP8jolrcCAjbHVMuihLw5FgQxlu-QpFa0g84k5nq3CbOXKdvhm.Zt9N8lkhoo7PLARN_JksUxHLI5fEGFOSjGHS2YSzvuc&dib_tag=se&keywords=dan+allosso&qid=1756425054&s=books&sprefix=dan+allosso%2Cstripbooks%2C149&sr=1-1).* My own position is somewhere in between. As an Environmental Historian, I agree with the idea that the natural world isn't just a neutral background for human action, but rather has played an important role in shaping the choices available to us (a big part of my definition of history). Some examples we'll cover right here at the beginning of the semester include the remoteness of North America and its accessibility during ice ages allowed Native American cultures to develop here without the influence of other cultures in Europe, Asia, or Africa, and the availability of animals that could be easily domesticated in Afro-Eurasia (cows, horses, sheep, goats, pigs, chickens) and _not in the Americas_, which caused cultures to develop differently in these different regions. I also, however, want to focus mostly on what humans did in response to these environmental conditions, not so much on the conditions themselves. Of course, _recorded history_ is only about five or six thousand years old. How do historians deal with times before people were writing things down? The answer to that question has probably occurred to you already: we use information provided by scholars and researchers in other disciplines. Typically in the past we collected insights from sciences like archaeology, geology, linguistics, and climatology. More recently we've had access to new techniques developed in evolutionary biology, genetics, and even satellite imaging and ground-penetrating radar. In some cases, new data from these disciplines has forced us to reevaluate and even change what we know about our remote past. This type of thing can happen even in more recent history, when new information is discovered; and we should remember that our understanding of the past is provisional, and _should change_ as new information becomes available. ----- Next: [[1.3 - Early Humans]] Back: [[1.1 - Big History]]